An Analytical Survey on Vein Pattern Recognition

Biometric is term of science to identify a person identity using their physiological features. Currently, vein pattern recognition has attracted the attention of the technology and industry all over the world. A vein is network of blood vessels under the skin of an individual. The vascular pattern is different for every person in the same part or region of the body. It is stable till very long age. As the veins are underneath the skin it is very difficult for intruder or forger to copy the feature. This uniqueness and strong immunity from intruders make it more potent biometric system which avails us secure features for individual identity verification. This paper involves the description of vein pattern recognition, its requirement and its importance in biometric system. Different feature extraction algorithms are reviewed as independent component analysis, principal component analysis method. For classification in vein pattern recognition we have reviewed support vector machine and neural network techniques. Parameters are described based on which results are computed like true positive, false positive, true negative, false negative, accuracy and precision

Aging in America: Time to Thrive

A demographic phenomenon occurring in recent decades in the United States suggests that individuals approaching their retirement years will have unprecedented leisure time available to them. This project surveys literature on aging research, reviews positive psychology research regarding how to achieve well-being, and blends these two fields of research into a discussion of pathways to positive aging, in order to provide this information to individuals who wish to thrive in the second half of their lives. By using foundational tenets of positive psychology such as character strengths, positive emotions, engagement in activities, meaning, and relationships, individuals can develop strategies to improve their well-being, which may increase their longevity, along with their psychosocial and physical health. Empirical research is reviewed to validate the aging discussion, with particular attention to the cohort group of American baby boomers entering retirement age

A Confucian Theory Of Crime

This dissertation is an analysis of pre-Qin Confucian philosophy as it pertains to crime and the crime related issues of personal control and social control. From this analysis of pre-Qin Confucian philosophy, a wholly new and distinct theory of crime is developed. Material relating to crime, and the crime related issues involving personal control and social control, is filtered out of an assortment of prominent pre-Qin Confucian texts (namely those of Confucius, Mencius, and Xunzi), dissected and juxtaposed with historical and modern Western criminological thought, and ultimately systematized into a unified Confucian theory of crime. This endeavor works to enrich our understanding of crime from a Confucian perspective, to advance our understanding of crime in general, and to enrich our understanding of Western criminological thought. An assortment of Western criminologically based empirical studies and theory are drawn upon to develop a prism from which to view and analyze Confucian criminological thought. A main directive of this dissertation is to enhance Western theories of crime and punishment by comparing them to, and, when appropriate, merging them with, Confucian philosophy, all within the context of theory building. Novel theoretical frameworks are generated from the merging of, and observations made between, the philosophical work of the pre-Qin Confucians and the criminological theory from such notable criminologists as Gabriel Tarde, Travis Hirschi, Michael Gottfredson, Edwin Sutherland, and John Braithwaite. Examples of deep theoretical connection and enrichment between traditions include Hirschian social bonding theory and Confucian ritual, and Gottfredson and Hirschiâs parenting approach to crime prevention (within the context of self-control theory) and Confucian parenting practices. A Confucian theory of crime is generated from this filtering process, analysis, and theory building, which details the Confucian theory for the causes of crime, and, also, the Confucian remedies for these causes. Three major remedies for criminality are constructed from the Confucian texts, these are: A focus on family unity and family cohesion, properly educating children both in a formal educational setting, and, importantly, in the home under the tutelage of the parents, and, lastly, the inclusion of ritual and ritualized patterns of prosocial behavior within the home, school, and community, so as to ingrain a deeper meaning and understanding of the tenets required by society to ensure its effective functioning

Patriarchal Trauma in Appalachian Literature

Patriarchal Trauma in Appalachian Literature examines the effects of subjugation on women as it is represented in three novels set in Appalachia. I define patriarchal trauma as an act causing mental anguish to a woman and perpetrated against her because she is a woman. I use the term to encompass violent, catastrophic harms but more particularly to pinpoint the traumatic effects of the quotidian, systemic deprivation of women’s autonomy. Reconsidering classic texts such as James Still’s River of Earth and Robert Morgan’s Gap Creek: The Story of a Marriage as narratives of women’s trauma establishes a lineage on the subject, which culminates in Lee Smith’s more recent Guests on Earth. This project eschews authenticity as an analytical tool, turning instead to modes of argument in feminism’s toolkit to delineate the potentially grim outcomes for women whose agency is constricted or usurped. While patriarchal control mechanisms such as domestic violence and sexual abuse inflict readily observable injuries on women, I argue that common, everyday subordination to men can exact a similar emotional toll, especially on women who strenuously defy male dominance. These traumatic states, I further contend, have previously been read as inevitable acquiescence or a genuine desire for subjugation in River and Gap Creek, respectively, while experiences of trauma in Guests are directly portrayed as mistaken interpretations of madness. Reassessing women characters’ numb, compliant, depressed, or enraged emotions as responses to patriarchal trauma challenges the practice of pathologizing women’s rebellion

A Culturally Aware Approach to Learning System Interface Design

This mixed methods research explored interface design strategies for users from different cultures and localized settings. Guided by the cultural-historical development theory and HCI research, four critical factors—navigation design, information organization, layout design, and visuals—were investigated in designing culturally relevant interfaces for Americans and Taiwanese. American and Taiwanese groups—both contained two sub-groups of 30 participants—were recruited for the quantitative phase. Each participant was exposed to only one interface with content composed in their native language. However, one sub-group in each ethnic group was exposed to a culturally relevant interface and another was exposed to an alien interface. MANOVA on overall performance in both American and Taiwanese groups were significant. Americans performed better using the American interface (Wilks’s Λ=.85, F= 5.15, p< .01). They had significantly shorter performance time in the American (M=775) than the Taiwanese (M=1003) interface (F=6.29, p<.05), but differences on performance accuracy were not significant (F=2.74, p=.103). Taiwanese performed better using the Taiwanese interface (Wilks’s Λ=.67, F=14.06, p< .01). They had shorter performance time in the Taiwanese (M=743) than the American (M=1353) interface (F=6.29, p<.05), and they also had higher performance accuracy on the Taiwanese (M=11.7) than the American (M=10.0) interface (F=7.94, p<.01). In addition, t-test on overall preference in both American and Taiwanese groups were significant. Americans preferred the American (M=58.5) over the Taiwanese (M=53.0) interface (t=2.11, p< .05). And Taiwanese preferred the Taiwanese (M=58.7) over the American (M=46.9) interface (t=3.48, p<.01). Qualitative interviews of six American and six Taiwanese participants revealed three themes: First, when searching, Taiwanese were explorative and relied on hierarchical relationships; while Americans relied on prior experiences and analytical categorizations. Second, both groups have higher affiliation with design features matching their preferences. Finally, matching design features with users’ expectations and needs promotes positive perceptions and enhances interface usability. Both quantitative and qualitative Results imply that user interface designers should consider cultural perspectives when designing interfaces for online learning systems. Further studies might consider the relative impacts of the navigation, information structure, layout, and visual design on a broad range of user differences might have on learning

Shame on you; shame in me: the impact of degradation on males who identify as gay

Literature in gender and identity studies does not reveal plentiful inquiry regarding the impact of shame, particularly with regard to males who identify as gay; however, the literature does reflect that people who identify as non-conformist with regard to sexual and gender identities often experience ongoing emotional and physical degradation in the forms of harassment, taunting, name-calling, physical aggression, assault, and violence. As a result of a void in the knowledge base about the intersection of degradation, shame, and identities, this study explores the experiences of males who identify as gay and who have experienced degradation resulting in shame. Working from a postmodern epistemology grounded in qualitative and feminist methodologies, using auto-ethnography and dialogue as methods, the author and four participants, deeply explore the experiences of external shame messages, how they became internalized, and how they were/are negotiated. The experiences of the participants including the author’s are contextualized within the so-called gay liberation movement. Several theoretical perspectives are examined including gender, identity and queer theories, particularly as they relate to how identities are shaped and how hegemony operates within particular identities that may be considered marginalized from the mainstream. Working from the perspective that codified identities are exclusive and restrictive, opportunities for (re)imagining identities with regard to gender and sexuality are explored theoretically and pragmatically. Models for confronting heterosexism and homophobia are presented in the arenas of religion, schooling, the media, and human services. Visibility as a person who is sexually and gender non-conformist is discussed as are the tensions between boundless and fluid imaginings of identity and the need for boundaries related to the impact on others of identities and practices/acts associated with them

Fathers investing in fatherhood: A qualitative examination of contemporary fathering in fatherhood groups in Canada

The existing literature and research on fathers in movements demonstrate differing approaches to understanding fatherhood, men’s engagement in the family pre/post separation, family law, and fatherhood/fathers’ rights activism. However, these approaches often fail to address the experiences of fathers, as well as fatherhood activists and movements, that exist outside the narrative created by the fathers’ rights-based approaches and pro-feminist responses that currently dominate the dialogue surrounding the issues of fatherhood movements/groups and the rights of fathers. Based on this problematization of the existing frameworks for and examinations of fatherhood movements, this two-part study examined the social engagement and experiences of fathers who belong to fatherhood groups across Canada, with a strong focus on British Columbia (BC). Phase one was an investigation of the parallel fathers’ rights movement (FRM) and involved fatherhood movement (IFM) Canada-wide. I conducted a qualitative content analysis of these two discourses through their online presence and activism, such as blogs, websites, and online resources. Phase two dovetailed off this analysis through in-depth interviews with fathers engaged in the FRM and IFM in BC, including a few fathers who reside outside of BC but were active in national groups engaged in this province. Together, the two phases provide an examination of fatherhood and fatherhood movements within a critical masculinities framework. This analysis highlights the privilege inherent within fatherhood groups and the exclusionary politics within these movements that resulted in the absence of the voices of Black, Indigenous, and people of colour (BIPOC) and marginalized fathers (e.g., fathers of low-socioeconomic status). Further, this research reflects on these fathers’ beliefs that they face disadvantage in family law proceedings, and problematizes and challenges their claims of bias, discrimination, and oppression. The concluding analysis also demonstrates the privilege, power, oppression, and inclusion/exclusion within fatherhood groups, movements, and discourses overall. Ultimately, this study captured men’s nuanced experiences with fatherhood and parenting pre/post separation, within the current socio-legal and familial contexts

Touring Extinction: The Rhetorics of Biodiversity Loss on Display

This thesis contends that communication scholars ought to investigate how and to what effect individual/collective rhetors seek to persuade humans about their interconnectedness with nonhumans and the physical world. Specifically, the author draws on his participant-observations of the American Museum of Natural History in Manhattan, New York, to rhetorically analyze the ways in which the institution renders intelligible to tourists the sixth mass extinction in natural history, an event known as the Holocene Extinction. By touring the American Museum and documenting his experiences through a series of critical vignettes, the author demonstrates how the institution, namely the Hall of Biodiversity, seeks to create an entangled public, or a collectivity of humans that see their wellbeing and the survival of the more-than-human world as entangled. As an outcome of this thesis, the author theorizes what he calls pedagogies of entanglement to refer to a class of instructional discourses that manifest in/through communication about the relationship between humans and the more-than-human world, a nascent phenomenon that he argues appears within and beyond the American Museum. To that end, the author calls for a more robust engagement with the pedagogies of entanglement that populate the discourses of other overlapping technical and public spheres. Doing so will provide rhetoricians with the opportunity to assess the effectivity of other situated pedagogies of entanglement in order to offer tools and recommendations to better human communication about the more-than-human world

Affect[ing] the Theory-Practice Gap in Social Justice Teacher Education: Exploring Student Teachers’ “Stuck Moments”

Set within a discursive field of humanist and neoliberal thought, this post-qualitative study attended to student teachers’ “stuck moments” in a university-based, social justice-oriented teacher education program (SJTE). It sought to problematize the familiar tendency of ascribing student teachers’ stuck moments as symptomatic of the theory-practice gap, an argument frequently lobbied by policy makers to dismantle university-based teacher education in favor of alternative (read: more lucrative) programs. Challenging the representational logic that undergirds prevailing conceptualizations of stuckness and the theory-practice gap obsession in teacher education, this study conceptualized stuck moments as a fluid, moving assemblage of bodies (human and nonhuman), and discursive, affective, and material forces. Informed by posthumanist theories of affect, this case study of six preservice teachers enrolled in an SJTE program used a rhizomatic mapping process that entailed assembling a series of wonder cabinets to map the discursive, affective, and material forces that shape student teachers’ stuck moment(s) and explore what these stuck moments do to student teachers. Data sources included field notes and jottings, individual and group conversations, and the creation of wonder cabinets of stuckness. The findings of this study suggest that the materiality of field placement sites (i.e., the physical and discursive), the pressure on student teachers to achieve teaching mastery, participants’ desire to have an impact on their students, and the challenges of enacting critical/justice practices, constitute the stuck moment assemblage. These constituting elements also illuminate the infiltration of learning discourses in student teachers’ stuckness. With their focus on mastery, normative teacher identity categories, measurable goals, and telos-driven progress narratives, learning discourses—while seductive for student teachers—collide with the tenuousness and uncertainty of social justice work. These discourses also generate and intensify the negative affects that animate student teachers’ stuck moments. These affects include, among others, worry, shame, and loneliness. This research foregrounds how stuckness holds the potential to simultaneously expose and oppose the conflicting discourses, affective attachments, and intensities, that student teachers encounter as they navigate through the various spaces of their SJTE program